Ok all you artsy and techy ppkers. I'm interested in buying photoshop for the first time and am overwhelmed with trying to research which program I need (elements, lightroom, or CS6). Since I am so new at this I don't even understand the terminology that they are using to describe the features enough to know if they are features I would need.

The main thing I want to do with photo editing is merge group photos to make sure everyone has their eyes open and is smiling. I'm told that isn't terribly hard to learn.

Are these things I can do in Photoshop Elements? Photoshop Lightroom? Or the full Photoshop CS6? I know I don't need the extended one since I certainly won't be doing anything in 3D.

The "puppet warp" thing sounds like the main feature I might want to use in the full version, but is it worth paying $250 instead of $80 for lightroom.

I'll definitely be hitting up all the free tutorials online to learn how to use whichever program I buy. Oh and I use Cannon DSLR eos t2i and a macbook. No plan on updating those for another couple of years if I can help it.

Have you tried using free alternatives life The GIMP (ignore the stupid name, it's a good piece of software)? It might be worth seeing what you can do with that before forking out on something more expensive.

_________________Moon - "This is the best recipe in the history of recipes forever."

Thanks Gulliver. I always assumed photoshop was the only option since that is synonymous with "edit a picture" these days, who knew there were so many options. I also need to investigate aperature too apparently.

I downloaded the free trial of lightroom and can't get it to do the editing I want, so I'm already thinking that won't be enough for me.

chiveggie, I use Aperture and I enjoy it but it won't do what you want it to do. It's pretty much like iPhoto except with deeper editing and customization options.

If it were me, I'd get started with Photoshop Elements. It's only $80 if you download it from the Mac App store and the description says it will do exactly what you want to do- merge the best aspects of a group of photos into one photo.

If you do decide to get the full CS6, make sure you get the student discount, as it is wayyyyyy cheaper. If you're not a student, pester your friends/relatives.

chiveggie,I bought corel paint shop pro photo x2 for around $100. It's a great program, the learning curve isn't to bad and you can try itfor 30 days before you buy. If you need any pointers drop me a line.

thanks jessy. I ended up buying Photoshop Elements Editor which was about $80. I'm using iphoto for organizing and then photoshop just to edit-or at least that's the plan for now. I haven't done too much yet, but a friend of mine is letting me use his lynda account so I can get extra free tutorials. I need to improve my artistic eye to even know what to do to make my photos better, but I'll get there.